I know I am behind on the blogs but there have been good reasons and I haven't forgotten anything on the trip that is blog-worthy :-)

We started out the 2nd day excited it was shorter than the first day but the moment we left our hotel in Las Cruces we had to deal with strong winds gusting up to 35 mph and to top it off, we were heading straight into it. Sure did make for a fun drive for Mike. We headed out of Las Cruces and the most exciting thing we saw was our first tumbleweed crossing in front of us on the highway. Who knows why it was so exciting but it's something you only see in the old west movies and here was one right in front of us....then a second one, and a third....and then it was old news and they were everywhere, lol. One of the things we did notice is when you are driving on a stretch of highway and there is one gas station/truck stop in 50 miles they are sure proud of them and have to make sure you know they are coming up by placing a billboard every 200 feet for the mile before you get to the exit. One thing that concerned us was the road signs that would pop up out of nowhere warning us of zero visibility possible and wind storms possible the next 45 miles...that's real reassuring driving down the highway. Luckily we never ran into any wind storms but did see some off in the distance. The only wildlife that was present were birds and one jackrabbit trying to outrun a moving train. We stopped a couple of times to fill up for gas and eat some lunch but New Mexico was that exciting :-) Heading into Arizona it started to sprinkle and we ran into some pretty good rainstorms but nothing that was unbearable. After we passed all the storms and the skies cleared I noticed a rainbow out the window and it was one of the most gorgeous sites I have seen on the trip so far. To make it even more special it was a full rainbow, I could see the start and end of it. I tried to get a picture of the whole thing but it was too close so I took as many pictures as I could. It is the most prominent rainbow I have ever seen and absolutely wonderful. We decided not to stay at Luke AFB for the main reason it only had one full bed, and for those of you who know Mike and I, we do not do a full bed, lol. We have a california king bed and can barely stand a queen size bed (mainly because Mike rolls into the middle of the bed throughout the night and will roll on top of me during the night in a small bed) so we decided to cancel the hotel there and stay in a fancy hotel that was cheap in Glendale (right outside of Phoenix to the northwest). They must have had a lot of rooms open because it was a 5 star hotel right next to the University of Phoenix arena (where the Arizona Cardinals play) and the Jobbing.com arena (where the NHL hockey team plays) and we got a deluxe room on the 10th floor (out of 11) for $99. The Holiday Day Inn Express was going for $109 so we decided to stay a little high class for the night. Right across the street from the hotel was The Westgate (best compared to the Galleria in Houston, an upscale mall). We chose to eat at Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville and had a blast. The entertainment was awesome, they had balloon artists on stilts! After seeing them work on a couple of other tables I wanted a flower. We had a blast visiting with the guy and laughing our butts off when he wanted to show a special trick and he would raise his "foot" up to his head and balance on one leg - amazing! We headed to bed after that and couldn't wait for the next day - we are heading to Vegas baby!!!!